Homestar Runner: Escape from Kanto
by Chakramchucker
Summary: After a mishap involving swirly photoshopped magic, Homestar Runner and Strong Bad are stranded in the Kanto region of the Pokemon universe. Now they must embark on a quest to find the nearest plug outlet while avoiding the greedy clutches of Team Rocket!
1. Of Gameboys in Blenders

A Pokemon/Homestar Runner Fan Fic(tion)

* * *

"And then I said to her, "No WAY, man. I'm keepin' this breadstick for later." And I stuck it in my fannybag," Homestar addressed the empty booth across from him, pausing as though awaiting some response to come from the empty air.

"I know, right," he agreed with the nobody he wasn't talking to. He glanced at a nonexistent watch before getting up with a sigh. "I guess I better get goin' to Strong Bad's house. He always needs help with his emails about this time o' day. You know how it is. Seeya later, booth."

Homestar casually trotted out of the quirky little diner that was Marshmallow's Last Stand and sure enough turned up at Strong Bad's doorstep a moment later- and by doorstep, I mean beside his computer desk. Homestar's ability to enter houses unwanted was impeccable as always.

However, Strong Bad was not present to appreciate his skills of intrusion.

"Hmmm…" Homestar surveyed the vacant room before plopping down on the stool and typing away at the keyboard. Heck, if Strong Bad wasn't gonna check emails, he could do it, and do it _better_!

"Hey, what- Homestar!" Strong Bad had appeared in the doorway with a blender in hand.

"Oh hi, Rondlebad. How was your…" Homestar tilted his head and read a sticky note on the wall dated for several weeks ago. "…dentist appt?" he inquired casually, pronouncing "appt" phonetically.

"Get off the Lappy, dipwit."

"No can do. You got a really big inbox so this'll probably take a while." Homestar Runner responded, typing away some more. Strong Bad narrowed his eyes and stowed the blender under an arm, freeing up the other to shove Homestar off the stool.

Homestar yelped, hitting the floor with a dull thud. Strong Bad stepped over him and set up the blender on the table. He dropped the cord on Homestar's face.

"Here, plug that in while you're down there."

"Check," Homestar grunted. He popped up to his feet a moment later. "Whatcha doon with that blender, anyways?"

"I'm using it to pay a visit to none-of-your-freakin-business," Strong Bad replied.

"Aw," Homestar muttered with disappointment. He'd been hoping it somehow involved food. Well, alternate universes might be fun and somehow involve food. "Can I come?"

"What do you think I'm gonna say?" Strong Bad snorted.

Homestar cleared his throat and took a step back. Pulling off a poor voice impression of Strong Bad, he said gruffly, "No way, Homestar. You can stay here and practice staying away from the blender and my Lappy while I'm gone."

Strong Bad stared at him for a minute. "Actually that-"

But Homestar kept going. He took a step forward, parodying his own voice this time. "Aww, come on Strong Bad."

He stepped back again and, as badly impersonated Strong Bad, he replied. "I said no. Now get lost before I punch you in the face."

"Oh yeah? Bring it on, man. Let's see what you got!" Homestar retorted as himself again, taking a fighting stance.

The real Strong Bad blinked. "Wow. Tell you what, how about you take the fight outside so you aren't breaking any of my highly expensive technologically sensitive equipment."

"Okay," Homestar obliged cheerfully.

"That guy has problems," Strong Bad muttered. He pulled a yellow dog whistle out of an unseen pocket. "Now let's see how much Bubs ripped me off on this The Cheat whistle." He gave it a blow but it made no noise.

Strong Bad glared at it and hit it on the table a few times before trying again to the same effect. "Man, what a piece of-"

"MEEEHHHH!"

The Cheat came zipping through the door to the computer room and crashed into Strong Bad's legs. Strong Bad looked from his yellow comrade in crime to the whistle and back again.

"Whoa! It must make those hypersonic noises only animals can hear. Nice," he remarked. "All right, The Cheat, time to man your station."

The Cheat saluted and hopped onto the stool, hitting puree on the blender. A portal opened up and Strong Bad walked through. It was then that Homestar ran back into the room.

The Cheat turned and glared at him, remarking on the interruption disapprovingly.

"I heard a whistle," Homestar replied, blinking. "Oh awesome, a portal." He walked toward it.

The Cheat hopped off the stool and latched on to Homestar's shirt, holding him back with great effort.

"Hey, let go! I just had that dry cleaned!" Homestar protested. He managed to shake him off at the expense of his balance, tripping over the blender cord and falling into the portal in the process. The blender crashed to the floor, spilling out the Gameboy before getting dragged by its cord into the portal right after Homestar.

The Cheat stared wide-eyed at the portal before bursting out in a fit of yammering and running around in a panicked circle.

Only Strong Sad was around to hear the noise. Figuring his brother had gone and blown up another computer or something similarly destructive, he abandoned his paper mache project to investigate the damage.

"What are you guys doin' in here?" Strong Sad wondered upon arriving at the scene. The stool was tipped over, Strong Bad's precious computer had been knocked to the edge of the desk where it now perched, threatening to fall off at any second. Oh, and there was still a huge swirling portal in the room, but no sign of the blender that usually enabled Strong Bad's alternate universe excursions. The Cheat was panting in the middle of the room, completely out of breath.

Strong Sad stooped to pick up the Gameboy and examined it. "So that's where my game went," he sighed in annoyance. He'd be very lucky if it worked at all now. Even if it did, he'd probably have to start over from scratch again. Damn, and he'd almost caught 'em all, too. Such was life.

The Cheat had taken up his panicky yammering again at Strong Sad's feet, spilling out the recent events faster than Strong Sad could follow.

"What do you mean he's stuck?" Strong Sad pushed the Lappy back onto the table properly before it, too, broke and Strong Bad made him get tech support to fix it again.

The Cheat continued chattering urgently.

"Hmm," Strong Sad considered the situation, looking at the portal thoughtfully for a minute."I might have a few ideas we could try." As much as he knew his brother and everyone else wouldn't thank or even acknowledge him for the effort afterwards, the chance to put his ingenuity to good use excited him more than a little. "To the kitchen!" He declared. "We're gonna need a lot of tinfoil."

The haphazard rescue team ventured downstairs and returned with armfuls of essential supplies. This included string, several kinds of tape, wire, tinfoil, and a toaster. At this rate, it was surprising the Strong house had any working appliances left.

They ran wire-wrapped tinfoil from the toaster to the portal, which took about a half hour to set up. Strong Sad put on a pair of safety goggles and stood back from the jury rigged mess they'd assembled. "On my mark," Strong Sad stated.

The Cheat stood under the table with a welding mask on, holding the plug for the toaster and waiting for the signal.

"3, 2, 1, mark!" Strong Sad pointed to his temporary assistant. The Cheat flipped down his welding mask and shoved the plug in the wall. The lights flickered and sparks flew from the wall and the toaster. Strong Sad shielded his eyes until he heard an explosion and the lights stopped flickering.

When he lowered his arm there was a dark burn on the floor where the toaster was a moment ago, but still no sign of Strong Bad and the portal was gone. The Cheat still stood under the desk, teetering back and forth and looking a little singed.

"Well, I didn't really expect it to work but it was worth a try," Strong Sad concluded. A certain welding mask flew up and hit him in the head. "Ow!"

The Cheat glared and hoarsely yapped several obscenities at the big gray source of his charred discomfort.

"I didn't hear you suggesting any ideas," Strong Sad retorted, rubbing his head. "Guess there's not much we can do but hope he comes back through on his own."

The Cheat kicked aside a piece of the ex-toaster and left the room with a final disgruntled yip. Strong Sad set his safety goggles on the table beside Strong Bad's lappy and got to work on cleaning up the mess he'd made. When he was done, he sat down on the stool and took up his Gameboy. To his great surprise, the battered thing still functioned- but as he'd predicted, all his game data had been erased. It figured. At least it would help him pass the time while he waited for some sign of his brother.


	2. Pikastar & Charbad

Strong Bad had materialized in the middle of a forest. It was one of those ominous, green, ancient-looking forests of the cliché adventure movie variety. This would have been just fine, but-

"Uh… this is definitely not the universe I was looking for." Strong Bad noted as he scanned his surroundings. He took a few steps forward and felt the damp ground squishing with every footfall. "Oh man, this place is like the Amazon." Suddenly he grinned. "Hey, that means there's gotta be some hot, topless native women around here somewhere." He tapped his chin.

"Yeah, just waiting thousands of years for the right guy to show up and rule their ancient temples full of gold and bless their… coconuts." He snickered and started threading his way through the gigantic primeval foliage. After a few steps he paused and sniffed the air. "Ah, the smell of a primitive tribal campfire. Wait…" He spun around and looked behind him. No sign of a fire or smoke anywhere. Why did something smell like charcoal?

He shrugged and decided to ignore that little oddity for the moment. Besides, he had better things on his mind. Better looking things-

The fern in front of him rustled and he stopped in his tracks. "Uh-oh." On second thought, maybe he should've gone back and prepared a little better for this. He was seriously lacking in the area of big knives and guns.

The brush rustled again and two huge compound eyes set in a chitinoid face goggled back at him. His brain hiccupped in horror for a split second before managing to motor his body out of there at top speed. He arrived back at his point of entry, panting for breath.

"Bad… ufh… idea," he muttered, leaning against a tree. "I'm gonna need to come back with about fifty gallons of insecticide and a machete… jeez, what next, giant-"

"Hey, Strong Badio-saurus!" Something yellow, fuzzy, and ridiculously Japanese-rodent-cute shoved its face into view.

"- rats?!" Strong Bad finished his statement, startled into stumbling backwards into the tree.

"Where?" The rodent backed off a step and looked around. It sounded irritatingly familiar, not to mention the white star-shaped patch of fur on its chest was a huge tipoff.

"Homestar?!"

"What?"

"You're a rat," Strong Bad said. "A… mutant one. And not the cool ninja kind, either."

The Homestar-rat-thing blinked and flicked a pointy ear. "Oh, _that_. Yeah, that's pretty weird, huh."

"Yes. Yes it is."

"By the way, your tail is on fire," Homestar pointed out calmly.

Strong Bad glanced over his shoulder. Sure enough, there was a tail there, and on the end of it was a good sized ball of flame flickering away like it was on a giant candle wick. Out of reflex he attempted to put it out, but he quickly stopped when a combination of nausea and panic swept over him.

"Here, let me try," Homestar offered.

"NO! …no, something tells me it's supposed to do that," Strong Bad said hastily. He briefly overlooked the rest of his new body before slouching moodily and scratching his head. "Man, I can't possibly rule a temple fulla topless Amazons like this. This universe sucks."

"Oh, I think I bought a movie from them once," Homestar said thoughtfully.

"The Cheat! Let's get some takin' me home puree action!" Strong Bad called out. There was no response. "Uh, The Cheat? Hello?"

"Ummm, Strong Bad there's probly something I should tell you," Homestar interrupted, pulling on his arm. Strong Bad shoved him off.

"Save it for nobody who cares," Strong Bad snapped.

"I'm pretty sure you'd care," Homestar pressed.

"And I'm pretty sure all I care about is getting out of this lame universe so I can kick you out of my house properly. The Cheat! What's going on up there!"

"But Strong Bad-"

"Shut up, Homestar."

"Strong Bad-"

"Fine, what?"

"Strong Bad."

"What do you _want_?"

"I forgot."

Strong Bad groaned and slapped a claw to his forehead. "The Cheat! Hit a freakin' button already!"

"Oh, The Cheat doesn't have the blender anymore," Homestar recalled.

Strong Bad eyed his klutzy companion, fearing the worst. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"It's right over there," Homestar pointed to where the blender was lying on its side, partially concealed by a shrub.

"Oh. Great," Strong Bad said flatly. He walked over to the blender and picked it up out of the dirt. Apparently he'd lost some height in this universe, because the blender seemed quite a bit bigger than it should have been.

"The good news is I don't think that game brick got zapped here." Homestar said. "Just the blender."

"That's not good news. That's very bad, "you guys are completely screwed" news." Strong Bad dusted the device off, then shoved it into Homestar's paws. "Carry this. We need to find the nearest plug outlet, pronto."

He set off in a random direction with Homestar straining along behind, the blender propped up on his small, furry back. Walking along on two legs was much harder as a yellow mutant mouse, however, so eventually he used the cord to tie the thing to his back and dropped down on all fours. From that vantage, Strong Bad seemed even taller. This irked him a bit, but decided he could live with it if it meant less straining.

"So, are we there yet?" he asked, catching up to his partner.

"No. We'd be there _faster_ if you'd quit dragging your stubby little feet," Strong Bad responded. Not as if he knew where exactly "there" was, much less if he was going in the right direction.

He paused again, waiting for Homestar to catch up. He had to admit, having a huge advantage in height over Homestar in this universe was rather enjoyable.

"Well your stupid blender needs to lay off the milkshakes. I think it gained like twenty pounds since I last carried it to my house," Homestar griped.

"You turned into a monster mouse since you last carried it to yo- wait, what are you doing stealing my blender?" Strong Bad demanded.

"I needed it to make Marzipan one o' those soy milk health shakes," Homestar explained. "Coz I called her fat again and I was trying to make up for it."

"Yeah, you need to stop doing that," Strong Bad advised.

"Well she kind of IS, I mean for all her stupid vegetarian-"

"I meant stealing people's stuff," Strong Bad interrupted.

"I didn't steal it, I borrowed it!" Homestar said defensively.

"To make a gross soy milkshake. I bet that's why my universe portal didn't work properly," Strong Bad retorted.

"Hey, don't you be dissin' my milkshakes! Everyone knows they bring all tha boys to the yard," Homestar huffed.

"Ugh…" Strong Bad rolled his eyes. The duo started moving again, but the progress was fleeting. No sooner had Strong Bad gotten several strides ahead of Homestar when the ground beneath them gave out and they plunged into a pitfall trap.

"Jeez, Strong Bad, looks like you need to lay off the milkshakes too," Homestar noted.

"Shut up, dork, this is a pitfall trap," Strong Bad snapped, getting to his feet. He leapt for the edge of the pit, but it was a few feet out of reach.

"Well, what have we got here?" A male voice drifted down from somewhere beyond the earth wall.

"I think there's a guy up there!" Homestar whispered to his companion.

"No, duh," Strong Bad growled.

Just then a man with glasses and teal hair peered over the edge of the pit. "Oh wow- Champeen, you'd better have a look at this! These specimens are highly unusual."

There was a rustle above and another face appeared. It was a girl with blonde hair. Both figures were wearing dark outfits with a bright red "R" emblazoned on the front.

"Awww! I've always wanted a Pikachu!" She exclaimed.

"You know the rules," the teal-haired man warned.

"Oh, Homeschool, lighten up. SERIOUSLY, LOOK AT IT. I need him!" Champeen insisted.

"The boss wants all the rare Pokemon taken back to headquarters. If he finds out we kept a Pikachu- even a NORMAL one- for ourselves, he'd have our heads!" Homeschool warned.

Champeen pouted. "FINE, crush my HOPES and DREAMS, why don't'cha."

"It is what we do," Homeschool reminded.

"That's true," Champeen grinned. She grabbed a tarp and threw it into the pit.

Homestar and Strong Bad yelped as everything went dark.

The next thing they knew, they felt themselves being hauled up out of the pit in a sack of very thick fabric.

"OwowowowowOW! Watch your stupid tail!" Homestar yelped, scrabbling around.

Watch y-your f-fee- ahaha STOP IT, dammit get your fuzz out of my face!" Strong Bad likewise squirmed and protested the cramped situation.

Homeschool and Champeen tied off the sack and momentarily admired their handiwork. Then, Homeschool adjusted his glasses and cleared his throat.

"_Now_ what?" Champeen asked.

Homeschool blinked. "We have to transport them…"

Champeen glanced at the sack for a second before she hefted up the squirming, protesting bag and shoved it in Homeschool's arms. "There ya go!" She grinned, walking away.

Homeschool yelped as the amorphous container lashed out at him, knocking his glasses askew. "This isn't what I meant!"

"I think I kicked something," Strong Bad said to his bag mate.

"Sorry, that was probably me," Homestar replied.

"No, no, I meant outside!" Strong Bad clarified exasperatedly. "Hey, I got an idea. Stop movin' around for a minute, crimany-"

"Champeen!" Homeschool called after his partner more earnestly, hobbling along with the bag held at arm's length.

Champeen waited for him, tapping her foot. "Yes?"

Homeschool hesitated. "Well, I… well I just fail to see the logic in making ME carry the goods all the time."

"Oh? Why's that?"

"Because I'm a student of the sciences and I-" Homeschool stopped in mid-explanation, his face going quite red before he hollered in pain and dropped the bag.

"Ow," Homestar yelped.

"Yes! I burned through the fabric," Strong Bad declared triumphantly. He began using his claws to work the hole larger while Homestar sat curled up to the side with his paws over his nose and mouth, trying not to choke on the smoke.

"I see your point," Champeen sighed, her hands on her hips. "We can't have you dropping the poor things all the way back to headquarters. You'll give them BRAIN DAMAGE."

"It burned me!" Homeschool complained, rubbing his hand. "You said the fabric was fire proof!"

"No, no, I said fire RESISTANT. I don't think there's much of a difference, though," Champeen clarified matter-of-factly.

"Yes, there is, which is exactly why I told you to get fire _proof_ fabric and not fire _resistant_ fabric," Homeschool snapped. "One can still burn and one can't!"

"Oh," Champeen pondered. "No wonder my watches keep breaking…"

"They're getting away!" Homeschool interrupted, lunging for the bag just as Strong Bad was attempting to squirm through the tear he'd made. Homestar was already out, waiting beyond the edge of the path.

"Run, idiot!" Strong Bad ordered, struggling against the fabric and Homeschool's grip.

"But-" Homestar paused with his front paw half off the ground, hesitant to abandon his only companion in the current universe. He planted his paws firmly and shouted at Strong Bad's assailants instead. "You guys- cut it out!"

"They talk!" Homeschool and Champeen blurted in unison.

"No, duh, four-eyes. Get your freakin' hands off me before I'm forced to amputate a finger," Strong Bad snarled.

Homeschool blinked, stunned enough to comply with the request. Strong Bad took full advantage of the opportunity and managed to tear free from the remains of the sack of fire resistant fabric to high-tail it into the forest right behind his fuzzy partner.

Champeen glanced between the pile of fabric and her partner for a few seconds before bursting out in a fit of giggles. "PFF, YOU JUST GOT INSULTED BY A CHARMELEON."

Homeschool merely glared at her. "We have to get those two back," he said firmly.

"For the boss…?" Champeen wondered.

"Forget the boss. Can you imagine what we could do with two talking Pokemon?" Homeschool smirked.

"Glad you're finally seeing it my way," Champeen grinned. She yanked a small red and white ball off her belt. "I am SO calling dibs on the Pikachu!"

"We'll have to track them down first," Homeschool said.

"I got it covered. Go, Mightyena!" There was a flash and the red and white sphere Champeen had been holding discharged its inhabitant- a gray and black hyena-like animal. "Okay, buddy, let's get ya a new playmate!" Champeen tousled its fur cheerfully.

Homeschool rolled his eyes. "We could've just followed their footprints…" He kicked at the ruined fabric and heard something rattle. "What the…?"

The Mightyena trotted over to investigate, nosing aside the folds of fabric to reveal… a blender.

"This just keeps getting _weirder_," Homeschool remarked. "What would a couple of Pokemon want with a blender?"

Champeen picked up the item in question, shrugging. "Maybe they like making smoothies." She briefly examined it before handing it to Homeschool. "Hang onto that for me, willya?"

Homeschool started to protest, but his enthusiastic partner had already gone traipsing off on the hunt with her Mightyena.


End file.
